It was HELL. I mean I loved the job-mingling with screws and nuts and motorcycle parts. But the person in charge of the shop really made me take a U-turn. Here's an account of my little adventure.
I was pretty excited to join work in the motorcycle repair shop yesterday. When the shop opened, the owner asked me to cut out the metal tubes from the tyre tubes. He gave me a metal scissors to work with and after much difficulty, I managed to complete that.
Then, he asked me to move one of the motorcycles to the roadside. When I lifted the stand, disaster struck. The motorcycle was just too heavy and I dropped it. The owner of the motorcycle shouted and called me 'stupid' for that. Great start! (sarcastically)
I was doing pretty great with repairing bicycle tyres. The problem only arose when I wanted to take out the motorcycle tyres. Taking out the front tyres was easy. However, that wasn't the case for the back tyres. I always forgot the position of the screws. That made the shop owner angry at times.
The next difficult part was changing the tyres. I had to pull out the tyre and the tube inside it form the rim and then replace it. I really struggled at first because the tyres were just too hard. I was using all the strength I could conjure yet nothing much happened. This made him angry as well because he thinks it easy. It would certainly be easy for him as he does it every day.
In the evening, another unlucky thing happened to me. There was this guy who came and told me to change the 'blake' in his motorcycle. I was clueless. Then, I asked him again, pointing to the parts and all that he could say was 'blake'. Then, he came closer and showed me what he wanted me to repair-the brake.
When I was loosening the screw, I heard him conversing in some Chinese dialect and (with my little knowledge about Chinese languages) heard him call me 'sohai'. I was pissed off. Why did he have to call me that when his mother didn't teach him how to say the 'r' sound? That time, I really fell like cursing him but I decided not to.
I went back home at 8.20 p.m. It was approximately 12 hours of work. I was dead tired. When I reached home, I could feel the strain on my knee ligaments whenever I bent my knees. My back felt like it was going to break anytime. Sleeping time on my bed felt like heaven last night.
This morning, when I woke up, I felt something strange about my hands. When I tried clinching my fingers into a fist, I realized that my right hand was swollen. I couldn't clinch my fingers properly. I had to force myself to do my morning stretching for my adductors and then quickly had my breakfast to go to work.
Today, things just got worse. He kept on complaining about how useless I was. I joined work with no knowledge about motorcycles and was determined to learn. But, he just expected me to know a lot of things. He kept on saying "Itu semua orang pun tahu" (Everyone knows how to do that). I felt like telling him "Go ask your wife to do this and see if she knows".
His nagging just continued. I was really sick of it. The thing is, he doesn't teach how to remove the tyres from the motorcycle properly and expects me to learn form watching. My problem was, every motorcycle seemed different and I didn't know why he took out or when to take out some screws. Half way through the morning, I knew I was going to quit.
And that's what I did. I said I'm going back home for lunch and I didn't go back to work after that. Right now, I'm sitting in front of my computer and blogging about that nightmare which just ended a few hours ago.
I really really love doing some hands-on work on motorcycles and bicycles. If only the shop owner was more patient to teach me step by step. If possible, I would like to join work in a similar place where I can strengthen my muscles and mental strength. Or, I might just decide to work as a promoter in a gym or sports shop.................
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